


Life Can Be Felt

by CalamityK



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, loosely, painter au, ziam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-06 18:52:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1110333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CalamityK/pseuds/CalamityK
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He lives a Life of bruised lips, red satin sheets, and skin against skin.<br/><i> He's trapped</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Life Can Be Felt

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scottmcniceass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scottmcniceass/gifts).



> So yeah. I deleted all my fics and now im reposting them.  
> And once upon a time I wrote this as a gift to Cailtin (scottmcniceass) Because she's one of my favorite ziam writers and still inspires the hell outta me.
> 
> Find me on tumblr at [bumstagram](bumstagram.tumblr.com)

He lives a life of bruised lips, red satin sheets, and skin against skin.

_He’s trapped._

\--------------

Life is nothing but an inhale and an exhale; thick smoke and cheap cigarettes, a glass of whiskey and a dirty bathroom stall, bruised knees and the touch of a stranger.

That’s how he spends his nights, sat alone in a booth surrounded by smoke. Pushed into the back of a seedy club waiting for someone, _anyone_ , to offer him a drink. He almost never goes home disappointed.

He’s been told it’s his eyes, or the set of his jaw; perhaps the way his raven hair slicks so well back into a quiff. But mostly he’s told it’s his eyes. Anyone would get trapped in his caramel gaze like a fly to spun sugar.

Truthfully he doesn’t care what part of him appeals to anyone; just as long as it gets him satisfied. _He’s never truly satisfied._ He’s never truly sober. The blood in his veins is all acrid liquor and ink from tattoos.

That’s just how life is.

\----------------

He was going to be an artist once. The faded paintings in Louis’s café remind him of that. He had talent, a case of supplies, and a dream his parents didn’t support.

A dream of moving to the city and painting the sky at its every stage from dawn till dusk, a dream that’s now shattered; caved in by the harshness of reality.

Louis slips into the booth across from him. Sliding a steaming cup of whatever was cheapest in front of him. He doesn’t smile; he doesn’t ask why Zayn was limping as he walked into the shop. He doesn’t pry.

Just like he doesn’t ask Louis where the bruise under his eye came from, or why he hasn’t mentioned Aiden in a week. That’s just the kind of friend’s they are.

He wonders if this is all their lives will ever be, bruises and aches from too many bad decisions, but he guesses that’s just how life is.

He wonders if they’ll ever be happy.

\----------------

His days are all shifts at the coffee shop. Bright smiles faked for the sake of every customer. He longs for a day when he and Louis give real ones. Eyes crinkled at the corners and a soft chuckle deep in their chests.

The bell on the door chimes and he immediately plasters on a smile. Then he’s sees it’s Niall, the lonely Irish bloke who’s never too far from a joint, and always too far from home.

He fits right in at the shop. Shifting around glassy eyed, messing up orders and passing out apologies with a smile to everyone he’s made late. He always gets away with it though, because Niall’s smiles are genuine. Zayn thinks is a side effect of the weed.

Niall’s just too high to feel trapped.

\----------------

Its two months after Christmas when Louis tells him about a boy named Harry. His eyes are bright when he describes milk chocolate curls that fall around a boyish face, and eyes that are green like springtime.

He watches Louis’s thumbs twitch together nervously as he speaks of a slow voice like honey or satin or the right amount of sugar in tea. He watches as Louis smiles and his eyes crinkle at the corners.

He watches Louis fall in love with someone he’s only just met.

He wishes him the best, truly he does.

\----------------

January is cold, but sweat rolls down his forehead. The loud bass of some song thumps its way through the cold night air, hitting the brick walls of the alley and echoing.

It is nothing more than background noise for him and another stranger with cold eyes, and warm hands; hands that roam and cup and demand. Hands that promise another night of whiskey flavored lust and a haze of self-loathing at dawn.

Life is nothing but a shot of dark liquor, backs pressed against the cold stones of an alleyway, and a sharp gasp of the only pleasure he knows how to feel.

Niall lives like he’s not afraid to die and Louis fell in love.

Zayn’s life goes on the same as always.

_He’s trapped._

\----------------

February is when his whole world stops.

He sees the boy at Harry’s birthday party. He’s all lean muscle and kind eyes. Brown eyes, big round pools of wet terracotta clay. They’re a mudslide and Zayn is drowning. His breath is caught in his lungs, burning and igniting and he wonders what this feeling is. He’s never felt it.

He can’t find words as Harry introduces him. _Liam,_ A soft name to match his soft smile.

Zayn fingers itch to paint for the first time in a long time. They itch to paint strong shoulders straining against a white t-shirt; rough stubble along a strong jaw, wide, soft lips that are just barely the darkest pink.

They itch to paint the invisible spark flowing from his hand to the bigger one shaking it.

 Liam says his name with a ‘nice to meet you’.

He wonders if life can be felt instead of just lived.

\----------------

Liam comes to the coffee shop on occasion. They chatter as he waits for his order to brew. It’s nice. It’s warm; friendly. It makes Zayn’s chest twist and his stomach flutter.

They have stuff in common; lots of stuff in common. They like the same movies, share the same love of animals. They even like the same superheroes. Liam reminds Zayn of the way life used to be, back when he still had dreams.

They never share an awkward silence, and Zayn wonders if this is what life is supposed to feel like. He wonders if this is what Louis felt the first time he saw Harry.

He slides the steaming cup across the counter wearing a smile that finally meets his eyes. He stills it though, it’s too soon. Liam takes a stool and carries on with a story about his childhood. Zayn listens and hums when he needs to respond.

Something about Liam is kind of perfect.

Everything about Zayn is kind of _not._

\----------------

His nights are now filled with the solid walls of his own flat, the sharp smell of acrylics, the feeling of something inside him changing.

His days are still filled with shifts at the coffee shop, but now those shifts are filled with a warm deep voice, playful banter and real smiles.

_He’s a little less trapped, he thinks._

\----------------

It’s May when Liam lets him paint him.

When he shows up at Zayn’s flat with a shy smile and a silk robe, Zayn feels again what he first felt. Gets lost again watching the sharp curve of Liam’s shoulders as the robe falls to the floor, he can barely hold his brush. He _can’t_ hold his focus.

Life is nothing but hours of stiff poses, pastel flesh colored paints, the sharp black lines of arrows inked into tan skin.

There’s a strange tension when he finishes, and simply gazes up at Liam standing stark naked in the middle of his flat. The tensions heats when Liam gazes right back.

\----------------

Two weeks into June the tension snaps. It snaps with the blinding red heat of Liam’s lips upon his in the middle of conversation; the wet feel of tongue against tongue.

It snaps with the slick slide of skin against skin and sweat trapped between them. It’s different than it’s ever felt.

Liam is a red hot heat where countless strangers where a distant blue chill. Liam is a ray of sun; daylight where Zayn’s many strangers were night.

Liam is life, and life is nothing but a bright, burning flame of a thousand stars; a name whispered into skin, and the feel of hands that are slow and careful.

Now he can live a life of dried acrylics, sunshine through double pane windows, and himself against Liam _._

_He’s free._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Tell me if you liked it:D


End file.
